As you say, the Vikings are a powerful warrior race. It is this very fact that caused them to suffer on the field. Back when lethal combat was allowed (only when the ball was in play of course) the Vikings were a team to be reckoned with. Much like the Yankees and their use of demolitions, actually. Then, with the acceptance of the Madden Clause in official rules, the Vikings lost the biggest advantage they had. Without the offensive capabilities of the berserker linemen, the whole team fell apart. Before, they would simply blitz and put the other team to the axe. Nowadays they cannot cut down the opposing teams numbers to gain the numerical advantage.

While it's true that the legendary Svein Forkbeard (who notably is on record for having put over thirty Saxon villages to the torch in 1020 AD), has recently been quoted as referring to last season's Viking team as "pussies", the truth is that rule changes over time have "softened" the game somewhat, relative to its earliest roots.

For example, burning, pillaging, raping, ransacking, and putting entire villages to the sword is largely discouraged in today's game, and rarely do we see public maimings or beheadings by battle ax (except when invoked by rule during divisional playoff games or as a mechanism for concluding double overtime), and sadly, the term "sudden death" is no longer historically accurate in that it is currently neither sudden nor resulting in actual death for any of the participants.

All of this aside, the current team president of football operations has stated that draft candidates appear to be "promising", and that the team is looking forward to returning to its "winning tradition" on the field, just as soon as Fran Tarkington can be cleared to resume duties at quarterback.